Potsdam Delights

Oh what a surprise,  a crazy French king in the 17th century decided to use most of the country's wealth to make himself the Varsailles Palace and he nearly sent the country broke in the process. The various palaces and pavilions of the 740 acre park Sanssouci (French for "carefree") were built between 1744 and 1860, originally as a summer retreat for Prussian King Friedrich II (Frederick the Great), who came here to steep himself in the arts, especially music.

The city of Potsdam is located about thirty minutes outside of Berlin in the former East Germany. Potsdam includes several magnificent castles that survived WWII largely without damage. One of my favourites was the Sanssouci Palace, unfortunately we were unable to look inside as it was closed on Mondays. However, we had the rest of the gardens to explore.

Sanssouci Palace is the most beautiful building, it was designed by Georg Wenzeslaus Konobelsdorff. We began with a walk around the grounds of the Sanssouci Palace. The garden is gigantic and worth walking through. There are many stairs leading down to the garden. I went a bit crazy with the camera at this stage as it was just so stunning, the view from below (seen here in this photo) is simply beautiful.

The other big castle in the parklands is the Neue Palais (New Palace) which was built 1763-1769.　We managed to do an excellent audio tour in our oversized slippers (slippers to go over our shoes so we wouldn't mark the marble floors) of this pink baroque palace which houses an amazing ballroom and a grotto room smothered in seashells and shiny stones. Opposite the main castle are two matching buildings which housed the business side of royalty.  Dinners were also cooked in the kitchens and were rushed to the King’s halls through underground passageways.  There are a lot of structural problems with the New Palace, so many of the more impressive and massive rooms were off-limits.  Still, it was definitely worth it.  Frederick apparently built it out of Silesia marble and brick as a boast of his conquest of Silesia.  

The park and the palaces have been well maintained. Walking through the monumental tree-lined avenues and past the backs of the grand terraces of the palaces, with only a few other visitors braving the cold and rain, it felt not so much like touring a historical site, as wandering around a home temporarily vacated by the residents.

The Chinese House built between 1754 to 1756. The pavilion was designed in the then-popular style of Chinoiserie, a mixture of ornamental rococo elements and parts of Oriental architecture.

We visited a few other castles such as the Meierei (dairy) which is located to the north of Sanssouci Palace, Charlottenhof Palace, the Roman Baths and Orangery Palace which was the former palace for foreign royal guests. 

We spent about five hours in total here at the Parklands.  It was a great day out, loads of walking and sightseeing.